Brightening colours in cartoon icons
Fairly basic technique tutorial. Requires knowledge of creating new layers, and chaning their opacities and blending modes. Made for PSP9; should work in most programs with layers.
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Drawn icons seem to have their colour washed out more often and easier than icons from photos.
I've cropped my icon, I've added gradients and brushes and text, and I've played with the colouring. But parts of Mimi aren't looking so great! I want her to really stand out, and she doesn't.
I make a new layer below the brushes and gradients, and above the Mimi layer. I set it to Multiply @ 50% opacity.
Using a good shade of pink for her hat, I use a small circle paint brush to colour in the area of the hat on this layer.
Using a mouse, I can't colour inside of lines to save my life. So I try to avoid getting too close to the edges. Once I've coloured in the area, I do a gaussian blur of 1 on the layer.
Next is her hair! I make another new layer, set at Multiply @ 50%. I colour in over her hair and do the guassian blur again.
Last is her clothing. Another new layer, Multiply @ 50%. I colour in over her clothing. I make my edging jagged towards the bottom of her skirt.
Eyes are another place where this can really come in handy, but Mimi's eyes here don't need it.
It's important to do each part of the picture you want to colour in on a different layer! Now that you have all the parts you need coloured, play with the opacities of the different layers. Keep going until you get it to look right. I end up with the Hat Layer at 66%, the clothing at 45%, and the hair at 51%.
My layer palette now looks like this:
Examples of other icons I've used this on:
to 
to 
to 
From
to .Drawn icons seem to have their colour washed out more often and easier than icons from photos.
I've cropped my icon, I've added gradients and brushes and text, and I've played with the colouring. But parts of Mimi aren't looking so great! I want her to really stand out, and she doesn't.
I make a new layer below the brushes and gradients, and above the Mimi layer. I set it to Multiply @ 50% opacity.
Using a good shade of pink for her hat, I use a small circle paint brush to colour in the area of the hat on this layer.
Using a mouse, I can't colour inside of lines to save my life. So I try to avoid getting too close to the edges. Once I've coloured in the area, I do a gaussian blur of 1 on the layer.
Next is her hair! I make another new layer, set at Multiply @ 50%. I colour in over her hair and do the guassian blur again.
Last is her clothing. Another new layer, Multiply @ 50%. I colour in over her clothing. I make my edging jagged towards the bottom of her skirt.
Eyes are another place where this can really come in handy, but Mimi's eyes here don't need it.
It's important to do each part of the picture you want to colour in on a different layer! Now that you have all the parts you need coloured, play with the opacities of the different layers. Keep going until you get it to look right. I end up with the Hat Layer at 66%, the clothing at 45%, and the hair at 51%.
My layer palette now looks like this:
Examples of other icons I've used this on:
to to to